"All the affairs of men should be managed by individuals or voluntary associations, and . . . the State should be abolished." —Benjamin Tucker

"You must first enable the government to control the governed; and in the next place oblige it to control itself." —James Madison

"Fat chance." —Sheldon Richman

Available Now! (click cover)

America's Counter-Revolution

The Constitution Revisited

From the back cover:

This book challenges the assumption that the Constitution was a landmark in the struggle for liberty. Instead, Sheldon Richman argues, it was the product of a counter-revolution, a setback for the radicalism represented by America’s break with the British empire. Drawing on careful, credible historical scholarship and contemporary political analysis, Richman suggests that this counter-revolution was the work of conservatives who sought a nation of “power, consequence, and grandeur.” America’s Counter-Revolution makes a persuasive case that the Constitution was a victory not for liberty but for the agendas and interests of a militaristic, aristocratic, privilege-seeking ruling class.

2 comments:

Dennis
said...

You summed it up really well, I always say "I'm a libertarian, not a constitutionalist". If the feds are thwarting local tyranny, great, if the locals are nullifying a tyrannical federal law, good for them. At this point there is no principle of centralization or decentralization to defend, the ship sailed a long time ago. Now we have to worry about real people suffering under oppressive laws, I'm more or less for whatever helps them.

Dennis, What if local gov and federal gov teamed up?Even if libertarians don't believe in the Constitution, it is still a good strategy to prevent full blown nazification.

We are in a real mess. If we go with full free market anarchy overnight, clean slate, no looking back, a lot of people will suffer far too much in the short term. On the other hand, if we try to dismantle the state bit-by-bit (or chunk-by-chunk, like Ron Paul wanted), it would take a long time, and even though the intensity of the pain experienced by people would be arguably lesser than pulling a Molinari, low intensity harm over a long period of time will be felt as worse than the reality we face today, and people will want to roll back.

And it is not as if the people is well informed. They don't know about mutualism, natural law, money, or the non-aggresion principle.

So even if the Constitution is a lost cause, it is still a cause that has to be fought. Most babies in libertarianism were born because of the fight for upholding the Constitution, and they are growing. It is easier to convert statists through the Constitution. If someone devises a better way to convert authoritarians into libertarians, I'll go with that. Until then, it is better to not burst this bubble.

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Unless otherwise noted, to the extent possible under law, Sheldon Richman has waived all copyright and related or neighboring rights to all original content on the Free Association blog, through the CC0 1.0 Universal Public Domain Dedication. This work is published from: United States.

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